My take on Ben Folds’ Songs for Silverman

Tuesday, June 28, 2005

Ben Folds is mostly known as the front man for his self-referential band the Ben Folds Five and his somber mainstream hit about a traumatic abortion called “Brick”. Most people easily typecast Ben as an “almost-hit” maker or overly associate him with “Brick” just like how most people tend to equate Incubus to “Drive” or Tool to Maynard Keenan. I’m not saying that “Brick” was a bad song; in fact I think it’s a good song—and I say again, a GOOD song, just not a GREAT one. Where I’m driving at is that there’s more to Ben Folds than Ben Folds Five and that cheeky, albeit shoddy Brick song.

What people fail to realize is that Ben is a talented multi-instrumentalist who favors the piano and his mocking wit. And in addition to the three albums with the `Five, he has a couple of solo albums that never made it to mainstream radio, which, during that time was busy giving airplay to R&B balladeers, Britney Spears, suicidal punk rockers, gangsters with gold teeth and what not. There was even a point in Ben’s career where he grew tired of all the politics in music that he just chose to have his music released over the internet in hopes of reaching a more discerning audience. For some time, he was playing gigs off his van and selling his EP’s to half-full bars across America.

His latest album Songs for Silverman extends his musical legacy; this is easily his most mature release to date and his superb piano playing coupled with his rock sensibilities make him sound like Elton John on steroids. In my opinion, Ben has always been the type of song writer who has an uncanny ability to write melodies out of his raw emotions but in this album he balances his teenage angst and drama with a pinch of fatherly wisdom and experience. In effect, this recording is sometimes sweet, sometimes sentimental, sometimes melancholic but NEVER cheesy.

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The betrayal

Time goes by so fast; And with it change. Alot has been said about change–
Although I could say easily that my favorite would be “There’s nothing constant in the world but change.” True enough; when me and —– first met, everything was bliss. There were countless times spent just gazing upon each others’ eyes and seeing nothing but pure love. But everything in life is a cycle and things began to deteriorate just as soon as everything built up. Mainly it was my fault, there were things that she was asking of me that I cannot bring myself to give; and for that I accept this punishment. For those of you who have watched the acclaimed movie “shawhank Redemption”, the circumstances surrounding what I feel now would be similar to Andrew Dufresne’s; Andrew was framed for the murder of his wife and he dropped a line something to the effect of “I killed her; but not the way the court is accusing me of.”
I feel the same way. I have acted immaturely during our time together and I feel that I have restrained her from what she truly wants to be, and I guess this is it. And as an ode to Dr. Frankenstein…”I have created a monster.”; Ponder this though, the deeds of the monster can be blamed only partly on the monster itself and partly on its creator. And I am guilty for what I have created.

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